La sombra del gato

This Hammer film has a unique story while boasting the typically good to great Hammer assets of editing (which is especially well done this time) and production and of course acting. The copy I saw was a very poor dub of a dub and a good version would rate higher. I'm not sure if this was a Scope movie or not, though many of Hammer's Black and White films were and the full frame version I saw looked cropped. Originally the cat was supposed to be shown only as a shadow, this might have in the long run been more effective, or at least explained the title, though it's the shadow of guilt it still refers too. I can't think of another Hammer film quite like this as far as plot or structure. It starts with a very good longish pre-credit sequence and has typically effective music throughout. Director John Gilling is under-appreciated and this film is unique in his output.

It is fast paced, stylish and fun, actor Andre Morell does a great freak out job. It can be a problem with films where most of the characters are bad guys to keep interest, but this group sweats in fear and celebrates their own misdeeds in a way that makes them engaging. You want them to die but you also somehow sympathize with the inevitable cruel nature of their fate.

Some nice shots of cat's glowing eyes by the way as well.

This horror film from the other side of the channel is for me the best horror film of the sixties, and among the best of all times. The trade mark of John Gilling, the films that comes first in my mind when I think about Gilling, and certainly not his first adventure and crime movies, though excellent. Gilling has never been better than here. This movie inspired an AVENGERS series - 60's - episode: THE HIDDEN TIGER, especially the cat scenes using subective camera, very very impressive, unforgettable. Andre Morell awesome for this little golden gem. In the US, eight years later, you also had a film which the topic and story telling were very close to this one: EYES OF THE CAT.

No supernatural creatures in this Hammer film, but a lot of the human cast in The Shadow Of The Cat thinks Tabitha is the feline from hell. Not that they don't deserve what happens to them.

The film opens with Andre Morrell murdering his wife who controls the family fortune and with the connivance of two servants Andrew Crawford and Freda Jackson. The only witness to the event was Tabitha the cat and the sight of the cat gives them guilty consciences.

Other relatives arrive including Barbara Shelley and her fiancé Conrad Phillips and Shelley is the only one that Tabitha behaves with. The others now influenced by Morrell all hate the cat, ascribing all kinds of supernatural behavior. And attempts to trap and kill it result in a whole lot of the cast being eliminated.

This is a good one from Hammer because it relies on the human failings for these people to fail. Tabitha has no powers, she's just smarter than the rest of the humans in the cast.

Cat's got Pussynality.

Although supposedly made under the name of BHP Productions for contractual reasons, there is no doubt that what you are watching is a Hammer film. Everything about it reflects the Hammer trademarks of the era. The lighting, the music, the photography, the use of the exteriors at Bray (Hammer's first and most fruitful home) and the ever-present Black Park (a green lung in urban Slough that Hammer turned into everything from a Swiss mountain stream to a tropical river filled with piranha fish) - nothing is out of place. The plot is typical Grand Guignol - a rich elderly woman is murdered by her relatives for her money. They might get away with it too, except her pet cat takes exception to the plot and decides to exact revenge. While not thought-provoking by any means, the film moves confidently and swiftly along. Director John (Plague of Zombies, The Reptile) Gilling papers enough shocks over the holes in the plot to keep it interesting and the cast (led by Barbara (The Gorgon) Shelley and Andre Morell) do their jobs efficiently and entertainingly. The movie, though, belongs to Tabitha... Oh, and do you get the significance of the widow's reading of Poe's "The Raven" at the start of the film? Creepy stuff!

While working from a script requiring more suspension of disbelief than the plot can easily sustain, and wrought with some leaps of logic, an entertaining movie nonetheless. This UK Gothic thriller takes place around 1900. Its greatest strengths are sincere, solid acting on the part of everyone, a brisk pace, and comfortable reliance on effective, familiar genre conventions. A fun viewing for fans of UK thrillers and horror flicks (although definitely of the former genre, not the latter), or of Barbara Shelley or Andre Morrell.